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Veteran's Affairs Plus discusses the issues that veterans in Las Vegas deal with on a daily basis. Your host, David L. Washington connects listeners with relevant community resources and information that they need to help veterans or themselves.
Wesley Knight 0:00
This is a KU NV studios original program. You're listening to special programming sponsored by making moves, life coaching services. The content of this program does not reflect the views or opinions of 91.5 jazz and more the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, or the Board of Regents of the Nevada System of Higher Education. You
Music 0:35
Come on, tell
Music 0:42
me what's going on. Great
Dave Washington 0:49
day Las Vegas. Great day Las Vegas. This is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more. I'm Dave Washington, your host. I got a few things to cover, and then we're going to have a discussion with our guests, the Hanks. They are good people from our community, and I am pleased with what I happened to get from from Charles through text, they did a piece, man that I trust. When you're able to see it, you will be appreciative of them both for doing it, because it's something that's vitally important to our overall safety as fellow human beings. So with that, I want to start out by saying that on Saturday before last, I had the great pleasure, unfortunately, to eulogize my my lifelong friend, best friend, Ray Allen Feaster AC sheet metal man, but to his family, particularly to his daughters, Regina, Anita, and Christian his granddaughter. I hope you guys were pleased with what me and Marshall was able to do to assist you guys with that service. So that was a chore. And you know, I was praying y'all that God don't let because I'm a cry baby. But I didn't cry. I said, God, give me the strength to get through this and say some fine words about this, this individual. But on another sad note, I don't know if you guys know Clarence Boone Smith. Long time. The Smith family has been in our community for many, many years. He passed away most recently. In fact, his services will be the day that this actually, this show actually airs this coming Saturday. So to the Smith family, we we express our condolences and know that Boone was a great guy. I mean, he was a quality guy, integrity, you name it. He worked for the school district for a number of years in there, I believe it was in the parks and recreation. I don't think that's the correct term, but he did a lot of work for them, and he's greatly appreciated. I also would like to do an in memoriam. Gosh, believe it or not, 25 years ago, Robert Sidney, Washington, that's my grandfather lived in LA, always come over to Vegas to visit with us. So I just wanted to acknowledge Him in memoriam. Also my mom, Eugenia, Washington, white, which we celebrated her again as my wife marched home. You know, it's been 20 years since your mom passed, so we did do something for her at the house with family back in May. Yeah, no, it's actually April that she passed. We did something on her birthday in May this past May. So others that I want to cover real quickly is Chris Bates. He was an individual that we lost this year to his family. Once again, we know you guys miss his loss. And Brian, Keith Wilson, Brian was a great athlete in our community. Young guy. He was born in 1957 and expired on the fourth of, fourth of April 2025 so again, just want to acknowledge those folks there and going. We lost. He was a Mayor Pro Tem down in North Las Vegas for a number of years. Bonnie best Janelle, a dear, dear family friend. And Bonnie was, she was quite the character. But we, oh, I'm being taped here by Miss Lisa. Okay. Well, that, that's our first anyway, yeah. So we wanted to acknowledge her, and we know her daughter, Sharla, really, really misses her. And then one of my colleagues at the fire service, in the fire service, Charles, the father of Bert Washington, Booker T Washington Jr, he expired earlier this year, and he was just a class, class guy. And I told Bert, I know you became a great fire chief because he had no choice. He came from goods. You guys heard it. Come from good stock, right? Bert came from great stock. So I know you miss your dad, as the other families do. So we just wanted to acknowledge that again in the memorial and Miss, Miss cooks, she Larry cooks, Margie cooks. These were long time residents of Highland village, and not Highland village, Highland square, but they, they were in this community for a lot of years, and she was a great lady that a lot of us had nothing but tremendous appreciation for her during her life. In terms of birthdays that I want to cover at the end of this month. For for December, we got Chris Goucher and we got Ted Kelly, Trenton edge. Trenton edge is where I go get my iced coffee in the morning. I'm still being videoed, yep. And then finally, a dear friend and hired my wife, Miss Eva Simmons and her husband passed away a couple years ago. George Simmons, great guy, great golfer. I never got an opportunity to golf with him, Charles, but I heard he could play a serious golfer with that. Ladies and gentlemen, I have the great pleasure of introducing Charles Hanks. He's a retired Metro executive officer, and I let him do the pleasure of his dear wife. No, I'll let her introduce herself. We're going to start with you, Charles, and then we'll go to Ms.
Charles Hanks 5:48
Lisa, well, first and foremost, Dave. Dave, I want to thank you for giving us the opportunity to be here. Well, as you may recall, I started out in 1989 with Metro Police, back in September 89 and went through February 2020 and we retired on the same day, February 5, 2020 so we walked away together, and Lisa was a civilian there. She'll tell you more about that. But had the honor of serving over 30 years with Metro Police, and had the fortune to achieve the rank of assistant Sheriff number three on department. Worked with our current governor, Joe Lombardo, who was then sheriff and as well as our current Sheriff, Sheriff Kevin McMahon. And so great career. Very blessed career. And right after that, I don't know if I ever told you, Dave, but I went over to Maui for 11 months, really, and I served as the number two deputy chief with the current chief over there, John Pelletier, so just right at 31 years of law enforcement, man, and I'll let Lisa share her history. Yeah.
Lisa Hanks 6:52
So I had an opportunity to come and work for the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department in 1994 I came on on the civilian side, and, you know, it was, really, was a blessing. I completed my education in California, received my master's in social work. And really, I had no idea that that degree, that education, would afford me an opportunity to work in so many different areas within the department. So I had an opportunity to serve as a supervisor for abuse, neglect. I was the director of the employment diversity program. I went on to serve as director of the police employees Assistance Program. And before I retired, I was the director of our records and fingerprint Bureau, and so director would kind of be equivalent to Captain, you know, a bureau commander, right? So I'm very proud of the impact that I was able to have on the agency, absolutely.
Dave Washington 8:01
So you guys are currently, as I sometimes refer to myself as one who's sucking off the public trough. But you know, when you've done that work, you know you don't, as my dad used to tell me, don't ever back up to get your check, because if you back up, that means you didn't do a good job. You wasn't really You didn't deserve it. So I know you guys are well deserved in terms of what you did there, but certainly great careers, obviously. But the thing that I really wanted to get you guys here to talk about was the video you did. It's what is it called? It's a media thing, you guys that that's out on the social media. I'm assuming that it's out there because you I got it right? I sent it to everybody I could think of, right? Tell us, please our listening audience, Charles, what was the inspiration behind it? How did you just come up with it, which is something that's very worthy of being seen by everyone. I'm talking about, not just here in our city, but around the world for that matter, because of what the turbulence and the evilness that's going on, right? Right?
Charles Hanks 9:00
Well, first of all, Dave, thank you so much for having us, and thank you so much for watching as as you may remember, I responded to October 1 routing, route 91 shooting at Mandalay Bay, which is still the deadliest mass shooting in our nation's history. And so I believe I still have scars from that day. You know, responding that night, and I talk about the emotional scars from that night. And Lisa, at the time, was with our she was the director of our police Employee Assistance Program. And if you if you recall, we lost an officer that day, and I think we had two, two other officers that were shot, honey, yeah. And so Lisa, you know, she was activated to handle that side of it to deal with the emotional trauma, as well as the loss of an officer, we had to bury him. And that being said, with this recent shooting that came up, you know, I talked to some churches before we traveled to Fresno, that's where she's originally from, and we went to. West Side church, church of God in Christ. And the pastor brought several other pastors together, and we talked about active shooter response and prevention and and we kind of took a break and kind of enjoyed retirement a little bit more. But after seeing what happened the other day in both Brown University as well as over there in Australia, it prompted me, and I think it prompted both of us, you know, we our nephew actually attended Brown and he often goes back to mentor other students who are still students at Brown University. And we actually have a daughter that's still in college. She's in your senior year down in Orange County in college. And so when I saw that, and I saw some of the things they were doing over in in Australia, where folks were taking their phones out and recording, I saw the man tackle the guy and try to take him down and and got the gun from him. But then eventually he the guy went and got another gun, and then shot the guy. Didn't kill him, right? But shot the guy that had disarmed him, and he failed to incapacitate him. And so, you know, Lisa approached me, she says, she said, seem like that's bothering you, honey. I said, Yeah, she said. I said, you know, we, we, I don't wear a uniform no more.
Dave Washington 11:15
Just stop you right here, man, it's something that them wise can do to touch your spirit and make you because my wife have done so many things to me, man, to make me do things that I'm like, what? I'm sorry. Go ahead, right?
Charles Hanks 11:27
But she, she said, she said, you know, it seems like this is is bothering you a little bit. And we had just started daveling around with the social media thing, you know, seeing different people do that. And I said, You know what, we always talk about helping people. I'd start a little Bible study a couple of years ago at the house. I get men together on the weekend and and we're all about trying to help. We've been so blessed, and God's had so much favor in our lives, Dave, that we look can we bless and help others? And so she said, Do you want to talk about? I said, You know what? I think I will. I said, I don't. We don't wear the uniform no more, but I have some knowledge that I think it helps some people, absolutely.
Dave Washington 12:02
Man, well, let me tell y'all those out there in the listening audience, if you have not seen it, and you got my number or my text, not text, but my email address, we're gonna float this thing out there, and I got a lot of different contacts, and I'm telling y'all it is worthy of being seen by citizens from around the world, because I think it will be a great help to you, because, see, I tell my children all the time, keep your head on a swivel, swivel, right? Because, man, you don't know what's going on out there. But, man, some of the key things that Lisa that he said, Run, get your butt out of the standing around video, even though videos can help with, you know, with an investigation, etc. But the key thing is, what is it? In the Bible, self preservation is, you know, that's number one, and you can't help nobody if you, you know, hanging around trying to and you get shot. Man, but again, I'm building this up because it touched me. Man, in fact, I hadn't even finished watching it, and I woke up at three o'clock in the morning. I think I text you, right, right, right.
Dave Washington 12:59
You did, like, five something. That's cool.
Dave Washington 13:03
Danny, what's wrong with you? Why you be let me show you how to be up
Charles Hanks 13:06
too, man, I'll be up too, but you can send it later. You can have it go a little later in the queue.
Dave Washington 13:11
She tried to show me that, but I don't remember that kind of stuff, but, but the bottom line, it just a little bit I saw at first made me wake up and whoo, y'all, you can learn so much. And I'm in public safety. Go ahead,
Lisa Hanks 13:22
Lisa, no you can. And I think what really touched me is because I asked the same question as you why now? You know, I'm like, Okay, so, babe, you've been retired now for five years. So what is it about this? Why now? And I mean, he looked at me and he shared, you know, if something happened to our nephew or our daughter and I didn't say what I needed to say, if I didn't share the knowledge that I have, I will be really heartbroken. And it was at that point that we went to paper and started writing out some of the key points that he needed to really hit on, and I'm very proud of him for doing that, because we need a voice out there. That's right. You know, we need someone with the knowledge that he has and the ability to share that knowledge. I agree. You know, we want nothing more as parents, as sisters, as brothers, as aunts and to keep each other safe.
Dave Washington 14:20
Well, I tell you, Lisa, when, when, when he talked about and I see his emotions, yeah, and so are mine, because when he, when I looked at it, he said about children that you guys had gone to this school and and they got relatives there. I'm like, yeah, man, but that's going to not only help them, but others as well. And I think we're gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna get it out there, brother, cause it's important, it's important to share that.
Charles Hanks 14:45
Well, you know, Dave, I have to go back to this too. When we started our little YouTube thing, we were looking at this where we could leave a legacy. You talk about your grandbaby, I like to cook. And I said they gonna be able to see their granddaddy cooking ribs. And. She could cook a college stuff. So that's what started us. We God has had so much favor in our lives. We don't need nothing, you know, and so if we could give back, that's what we all about. But if you want me to get into it, I will say this. I did another video, a little shorter version the one you looked at originally was 33 minutes. It was just her asking me some questions. She just went at me and and and we wasn't even really scripted. She just said, Let's just talk. Keep it keep it real. It's right here, baby. It's right there in your heart. And I said, You're right. We didn't have to think about it. We didn't have a script. And then what I did is I shortened it up a little bit so you you got a 33 minute video there that you watch originally. And I don't know if you saw the second one, have not, but I did a second one was that your daughter outside that we saw, and she saw, she liked my truck. What I did is I did another one, like nine minutes, and I used the AI system in the truck to talk about it and everything. And while I'm driving the truck, AI system, it's called grok in the cyber truck. And that's like nine minutes. And I shorten it because our young people, you and I will sit there and watch it for 3040, it could be an hour. We'll put it on the TV screen sometime, right? And the young folks, they just swipe. It's real quick. So I did one like nine minutes. And the bottom line is this, prevention is the key. And a lot of people think you can't prevent an active shooter, but you, you and I both know what happens the day after that. After these, these clowns go do their thing. Folks usually show up and say, yeah, he started acting crazy. She started acting crazy, yeah. So there was signs, and that's one of the things I wanted to let folks know, is that we had a term called, and you probably remember this, Dave, jdlr, just don't look right. Okay? That's when that spidey sense kick in, and you feel like some just ain't right. And so you, if you recall, after all of this stuff started happening, they started talking about, see something, say something, right? And it's no longer crying wolf. People used to be hesitant to call when someone's acting erratic or acting crazed, or what have you. And so the police have learned to come and check that out and evaluate and some stuff is just, oh, it's not that unusual. But then there's some unusual behavior, and there could be some intervention. And so the key that I wanted to get out to folks is that don't dismiss things that that trigger you to be concerned. Absolutely, if somebody's quitting their job and say, I'm about to shoot up the play, so I'm gonna shoot up the school. Or, you know, you get a parent arguing with a teacher and say, I'm coming back up, and somebody need to call on that person, or somebody fighting at the church.
Dave Washington 17:36
Absolutely, once again, this is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more. Heather Hanks, brother, Charles and miss. Lisa. Look, I had an employee in one of my areas. I don't think I wasn't even a deputy chief. I was a battalion chief, but he said, This guy talked about shooting up the place. I said, Man, he needs to go to, what's the program you ran? He police assist. Polices, yeah, employee assistance. You need to go to employ your sister counsel. Hey, man, if he had done something, yeah, all of us would be in trouble. Because, you know, and you're not saying anything, I said that. Man, got to get some counsel, right?
Charles Hanks 18:12
Yeah, we used to call it going post exactly, I said,
Dave Washington 18:15
Man, so we got, we got the guy to get in and talk to somebody. Man, because when some people start talking like this. Man, it don't, you don't know what might just take them over the edge to actually do what they said, what they talked about, what they were threatening to do. But man, so very excited. So very exciting. Man, is the fact that again, when I, when I watched the thing, the second time I say, man, this man is touched by this, that's why he's doing it. But I just had to have you to share that with the listening audience, man, that you had family there and the brother, the brother got very emotional right here in the studio. So it tells me, again, you're very touched by that, but you're going to help somebody.
Charles Hanks 18:53
Charles, oh, if here's the deal, here's what I committed to, and we talked about this, if one person hears that, one person, and they report it, and it saves a life. You never, we never get credit for what we prevent. You know, in firefighting, you didn't get credit for the fires y'all prevented. You know, fire prevention that you taught different things to people to do. That's right, but, but you you save lives. And sometimes we want to make that threshold so high that we could have an influence that we didn't realize we could have. And so I said, Here I am sitting around, very fortunate. I have knowledge that I could share something. Just don't look right. Jdlr, see something, say some call the police. Now, if it's not immediate threat, no need to call 911, you could call the non emergency number, but the key, and like you said, You locked in on that's the prevention, is the response, and that's why I talked about Run, Hide and fight.
Dave Washington 19:46
That's right, that's right. Because and like, I say, Man, when I'm saying man, I'm sending this to everybody I know and tell them to share it as well. Because, again, there's things that you don't think about right, you know, particularly as a civilian, but when you in public, say. The year, you always checking things out. That's why I tell my children all the time. They're adults now I'm telling my grandchildren, keep your head on a swivel, right? Because there's some wild, crazy people out there.
Lisa Hanks 20:11
Absolutely, you know, we sometimes, and I think now in our society, now, everybody's head is down in their phone, you know, and you're looking down, and it's just so important to just be aware of your surroundings. Make eye contact with people, you know. Oftentimes, if you're walking by and you're looking someone and you can identify who they are, they might be more apt to keep walking, you know. But if your head is down and you don't know who's you know who's around you, you may become a victim, you know. So keep your focus up. Make eye contact. Look at people, you know.
Charles Hanks 20:49
Well, the thing Lisa just talked about Dave is, you know, you see the people on their phones. I mean, my daughter's very much into social media influence and content creator, and oftentimes we're out eating, and she go, the camera got to eat first, and he's taking a picture of the food, right? You know what I'm saying. And what folks don't realize is their subconscious. They've conditioned themselves to just throw that camera up and start videotaping everything. And if you go back and look at that Bondy beach situation over there in Australia, you got people filming this man while he's shooting people, right? And all they do is turn and shoot them. And I said, Come on, folks. And what's happening is a lot of people don't even understand or think about the mental preparation of what to do. And so our desire was that perhaps we could say something to someone that they'll think about it and think about, what should I do? Because we often live in fear, and then we're traumatized even after the event, right? You know. And it's like I often say to Dave, you may have recall I said in there, it's not a matter of if, but when the threat is real, the threat is real, that's right. And in the world that we live in today, it's not going away,
Dave Washington 21:55
you know. And you mentioned Kevin, the current sheriff. He's been on the show a couple of times. I've been trying to get him again, but he's gotten so busy now, man, with all the things that are going on. But one thing I told him I admire about him, and particularly about the last thing that he's done, he's hired some, I think, a psychiatrist or psychologist, wellness program, wellness program, talk a little bit about that,
Charles Hanks 22:14
because I think it's important at least to talk about she actually, she actually hired the Well, I'll let her tell
Lisa Hanks 22:20
the guy, yeah, you know, I'm so blessed. You know, actually, the current director of the police employees assistance program actually I was, I'm so proud that I brought him on to my team when I was there. But I'll tell you what I will say this, Sheriff McMahon has always been committed to the health and the well being of the employees on that agency, yes, and then those extended family members, that's right, he has always been committed and so to see the Wellness Center develop. And so now they have several different psychologists on board that's right. And you know what, I think, what has really happened, that has really been successful, is kind of that, that term that we often say it's okay to not be okay. And I think as first responders, it's kind of that, that perception that it is not strong to not be okay, right? We always have to present that everything is fine, everything is okay. But when you are seeing things every day that just are not normal for your psyche, for your mind, you have to process that. That's right. And then the question becomes, how are you processing that? And where are those things showing up? You know? And so now it's no surprise that for first responders, we have a high level of divorce, we have a high level of of alcoholism and those kind of things, because we're not processing the stressors that we're seeing every single day. And that's
Dave Washington 23:54
not normal. I see you still got that energy. You still
Charles Hanks 23:58
I am so passionate about it. I truly am, and I'm so glad that that passion, that that I have for it also extends to so many members of that agency, right? And they are really establishing and really breaking the ground on how it is to be done. So I'm very proud of the for I'm very proud of LV, MPD, absolutely.
Dave Washington 24:21
You know, I served on the Metropolitan Police committee's multicultural committee through Ramadan. Ramadan, I served with four, four different shirts, and Kevin would have been the fifth one. I said, Man, I'm done, but I tell you, to your point about not stepping up to the plate and and letting it be known that you you're feeling something. One of my guys, in fact, his birthday, he's deceased now, but Theo Adams, he his mom moved here when he got hurt, he no rollover of an engine, and he stayed alive. Generally, people who are quadriplegic, they may last two or three years. He last about 15 years because his mom came here and made sure his care was proper. But I can tell. You that our incident debriefing person, whom I've talked to since, and I've had her on this show, Chief, we need to talk this after it happened. No, I'm good. I'm good. I run a program that I'm the gene Campbell chief. Eugene Campbell will be taking over in January, called the Carl Holmes executive development institute. I got debriefed at dealer University in a classroom where, when a female officer said, Chief, were you ever debriefed on that incident? I started crying. I haven't cried since. I was carrying Charles on my shoulders and didn't even really impact up his injury was causing me. But I was tough guy, right? I'm good.
Charles Hanks 25:35
We compartmentalize. We compartmentalize it because we we run towards the gunfire. You run towards the fire, yeah. And so you can't, you can't share that emotion at that time. And so you got to put it to get keep it together as you go out there and their rescue. And that's why I have so much admiration and respect for our first responders, both on the police side and the fireside.
Dave Washington 25:58
That's right. EMS all those, you know, absolutely, ambulance driving, yes, everybody, man, because, and back to your point of videoing. I didn't, I don't want to see it, even though I know they're not, they're not stupid enough. You would hope the media not to show what a kid the young man killed a kid in West Las Vegas just the other week. Wow, chasing him and people videoing, right? Nobody trying to help, right, right? Like, come on, y'all right, but anyway, y'all it has been an honor to have you guys. And we probably got about two minutes for some closing remarks.
Charles Hanks 26:26
I just want to come back again. Jdlr, just don't look right. See Something, Say Something. Run Hide, Fight if it happens. And then after math, not just the physically injured, to emotionally injured. Like Lisa said, it's okay not to be okay. Get get some help, get your pastor, get some counseling, get somebody to help you from that trauma that you experience. Anything else you want to add,
Lisa Hanks 26:48
honey, yeah, no. Thank you so much for having us and and I just it's truly, truly a blessing to be able to share this information with our community. So thank you for having
Dave Washington 26:59
no I think when we have platforms, and I continue to tell people, I'm not a journalist, but I do have a platform, and when there's something that needs to be shared with our community, this is Veterans Affairs. I generally deal with veterans for the most part, trying to make sure they get their benefits. But I put the plus on there because there may be some other things that need to be discussed, and this is one of them,
Charles Hanks 27:19
for sure, right? Well, if they want to watch the video, Dave, it said Charles Hank, the number three on YouTube. Same one you saw Charles Hank. The number the number three is right there if they want to see it. And I think it'll be worth it, or hopefully they see this
Dave Washington 27:32
and see that. Man, you're smart and you're more aware of that social media stuff than me, because I wouldn't, I gotta. I got a Facebook account, whatever it is, and I already know how to get on the thing I can only I'm
Charles Hanks 27:43
still learning too. Man, don't feel bad. My kids have to help me. I have to ask her, Hey baby, what I'm doing. You know so
Dave Washington 27:50
and Marsh would tell me, didn't I show you that yesterday? Hey.
Charles Hanks 27:54
But you know what? We could still you do it. Look at your platform, and I salute you, brother, for what you're doing, and the fact that you had us on here, we're going to help somebody, man. So God bless you, and thank you for taking the time to give us this opportunity to
Dave Washington 28:07
share, for sure, once again, lost figures. This is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and Moorhead the hanks here, brother Charles and his wonderful wife Lisa, retirees from the Metropolitan Police Department. Y'all have a great holiday seat.
Charles Hanks 28:20
You too as well. God bless you.
Music 28:40
Oh, all the smoke in the air, till the hate when they stare, all the pain that we bear.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai